


Distance

by Solemnly_Swear (Fitzsimmonsx)



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, Canon Compliant, Character Study, Gen, just a look inside both their minds, processing the distance between the two in season 4, season 4
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-01
Updated: 2021-02-01
Packaged: 2021-03-11 23:20:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,755
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29125593
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fitzsimmonsx/pseuds/Solemnly_Swear
Summary: Dean isn’t sleeping. Not properly. Part of it is that he’s on watch for Sam, looking at the dark outline of his brother in the other bed, chest rising and falling, confirming that he’s there and not off with Ruby, indulging his demon side and his taste for twisted heroism. But the other part of it is the dreams— the memories of hell. The endless screaming and terror and the scorching fire.
Relationships: Dean Winchester & Sam Winchester
Comments: 2
Kudos: 3





	1. Dean

**Author's Note:**

> Was scrolling through my notes app and came across this sorta disjointed look into their minds during season 4? It was originally meant to be some character study in preparation for a fix-it fic, but it ended up being more insight-centered and less fix-everything :/.

Dean isn’t sleeping. Not properly. Part of it is that he’s on watch for Sam, looking at the dark outline of his brother in the other bed, chest rising and falling, confirming that he’s there and not off with Ruby, indulging his demon side and his taste for twisted heroism. But the other part of it is the dreams— the memories of hell. The endless screaming and terror and the scorching fire.

In his dreams, Dean screams himself hoarse; he cries until his head aches and there are no more tears left; he clenches his fists so hard that his fingers dig into his flesh and create gaping, bloody sores, and still they’re the least painful wounds on his body. And when he wakes up, in the dark, he’s quiet because he knows that whatever’s chasing him, punishing him, finding him, can’t know his weakness (and he is weak, it is obvious now).

He’s used to waking up from the occasional nightmare with Sam’s silent, concerned look turned on him, with the opportunity to talk or to take the warm fortitude that is Sam’s regard. But now, when Dean wakes up, Sam sleeps on. And Dean can’t help but feel that he doesn’t deserve it anyways, and that he’s not entirely sure he wants it. What would this Sam do if he found out about the nightmares? Would he up and leave?

He’s been on edge, recently, and Dean’s caught the idea of it in his eyes, in the sharp way they flick to the door and back, in the cold turn of his head to the passenger window, never to Dean in the driver’s seat. Dean’s been making passive-aggressive jabs about Sam’s secret keeping and Sam’s been even more withdrawn and— Dean told himself this was what he wanted, but in his weakest moments, he admits to himself that all he wants is his brother back.  _His_ Sammy. 

He’s been pretending for so long that this is the same Sam he’s dealing with, the same Sam that he left on his not-so-one-way trip to hell and then came back to, a little worse for wear. He’s been operating under the assumption that maybe Sammy got a little twisted while Dean was away. Maybe he did the wrong things for the right reasons and just needs a guiding force, someone to tell him no, someone to remind him that the evil inside him doesn’t have to devour him.

But— well, that doesn’t explain the rest of Sam. Sam is cold and vicious at times, and closed off too. No more little wounded looks about Dean’s latest refusal to share, no prodding about Dean’s well-being. Hell, no Sammy-breakdowns or bitchfaces about his own current predicament. The coming apocalypse, Ruby, and Sam’s role in it all. Sam’s just not talking.

It’s exactly what Dean’s wished for this whole time, but now that it’s happening, he can’t help but look at his brother— at that broad frame he knows so well, at the puppy dog eyes and the long hair that Dean gave up begging him to cut ages ago (“fits, Sammy, you look like a girl”)— and realize that he doesn’t really know him at all. Not anymore. Something’s changed and he can feel his brother fading away from him and it’s the most he can do to just keep himself from grasping tighter and losing him entirely.

No, this is better. The simmering, barely-hidden resentment and the passive-aggressive jabs and the choking, terrified moment he opens his eyes in the bed of their latest motel room and his eyes find Sam’s figure in the next bed over and his breath comes a little easier, in little choked-off gasps that barely make a noise at all (unlike the rapid, pounding beating of Dean’s heart in his chest— if anything will wake Sam up, he figures it’ll be that).  


* * *

Dean’s scared of Sam leaving him. But they’re so far apart these days that he can’t even get to know the Sam he’s with right now. He sees him in flashes instead: the way he talks to witnesses, no longer all good cop with the puppy dog eyes, a little more self aware now. Smooth sincerity with a hidden sharp edge. He’s always been that way, but the edge has been sharpened now, Dean can tell— Sam could do these hunts all on his own. 

He acts different on his own, too. No longer that absent-minded absorption in his research. He’s always on alert, scanning his surroundings. His research is quick and perfunctory and there’s none of that Sammy-excitement in his voice when he stumbles upon a clue or remembers something relevant or translates a piece of information. 

It’s— well, it’s like Sam’s become a hunter all his own, and it’s what Dean’s wanted all these years, but he’s quickly realizing that he only told himself he wanted Sam as a hunter. What he really wanted was Sam at his side, Sam lounging in the passenger’s seat and turning those fierce-excited eyes on Dean after hours spent finding the answer. Sam messing up with a witness and stumbling over his words in his hurry to backtrack and turning an alternately pleading and pissed gaze on Dean to work his magic and smooth it over. 

(He doesn’t get many Sammy glances these days. Just glares and perfunctory ones that slide right over him, as if he never even came back. And on the worst of days, Sam doesn’t look at him at all. With hell fresh in his mind from the night before, it’s easy to imagine that Sam’s right, that Dean is still in hell and Sam is still up here.)

(In his darkest moments, Dean thinks that maybe Sam was better off that way. Maybe the kid had something going, but now Dean is back and it’s his  _job_ to watch out for Sam. And if Sam doesn’t want that, maybe Dean shouldn’t be back at all. When these thoughts are running through his head and he’s feeling a little too angsty, he turns up the music, just to get that familiar bitchface pointing his way. His world might be falling apart, cracking open to reveal hellfire and demons, but at its center is still Sammy who can take endless hours of Dean’s music but threatens to walk if Dean turns it up the slightest bit.)  


* * *

Castiel turns up at random intervals, reminding Dean about Sam, but Dean keeps his distance. Stops mentioning Castiel around Sam because he reacts the same way Dean does when Ruby comes up. He slips, though, one day during a hunt, alludes to all the previous conversations that he’s been tactfully not mentioning to Sam, and Sam breaks. They’re in the middle of a hunt and he’s screaming, about how Dean trusts this angel more than Sam, how Dean never even believed in angels.

And it becomes clear that it’s not even entirely about Dean. Sam’s believed in God and angels and goodness this whole time, and they finally exist, and they’re trying to smite him down. This good that he’s believed in thinks he shouldn’t be alive. Dean hasn’t quite thought of it that way (when was there a day that something didn’t want to kill them?) but it messes with his head, too, finally thinking about how the Greater Good up there wants his little brother dead, Sammy with the bright eyes and the begrudging smile.

And— well, Dean doesn’t know what it means about him (he does: he is hopelessly devoted, immorally attached) but if it comes down to it, he’ll choose his Sammy over the forces of good themselves. And he tells Sam as much, that he’s never even heard of the fuckers before all this, hell if they’re going to tear his family apart, and he earns the first smile Sam’s given him in months.

Dean takes to ignoring Castiel a little when he visits, replying just enough to appease him but not enough to let this go any further. They just need a little time. Time for Sam to be Sam again and for the forces of heaven and hell to just fuck off and, mostly, time for Dean to just be with his brother again. Just two brothers on a road trip again, saving people and hunting things. The family business.


	2. Sam

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A lot shorter than Dean’s perspective. Just a pair of thoughts/insights.

Sam can’t take the way Dean looks at him. He watches him, now, not that protective big brother look or the fondness he used to turn on Sam occasionally, full blast casually affectionate Dean, that would soak into Sam’s heart and stay there. No, it’s like he’s a  thing  now. Something that Dean’s hunting or might in the future. Something dangerous and wrong and evil.

Sam hasn’t felt this young around his brother in ages and he hates how small he feels, as if he should just give in and lay it all at Dean’s feet and wait for judgement. Dean is the center of his world and if he thinks Sam should be smited like these angels want, isn’t that it? Final judgement?

But he’s been on his own long enough to pull away and stand up for himself, to look out the window and ignore the way Dean keeps looking at him, watching, always watching, even in the darkness of the motel room as if Sam will hulk out in his sleep or sneak off into the night and never return.

* * *

It’s not the same as it was before, with his powers. Before, they were in his blood, but in his blood, too, pumped family and Dad and  _Dean_. Now, his powers are a part of him, just like living and breathing and researching, and it’s not something he can turn off. 

When they run into a demon and have the option of a knife or Sam’s mind, Sam’s not sure he can keep up this diet of no-demon-blood-given-powers. Sam knows the risks but he also knows that it’s their job to save people. Can they kill an innocent person just on the risk that Sam goes evil? 

(Sam hates it. Before Dean got back, these powers felt promising, like a way to save people and carry on. Now, they feel filthy, evil. His brother loves him but not the powers, and that’s a distinction that means Dean doesn’t love  _Sam_ anymore, not fully, not us-against-the-world like it always was before. And if that doesn’t create distance itself, Sam does, because he can’t bear to see the truth of it in Dean’s eyes.)


End file.
